Unlimited 3G Data on 4G Verizon Phones for $50 on Prepaid Plan?

I found a couple of phones (including some MiFi devices) on eBay claiming to have unlimited 3G date on 4G Verizon phones for $50 (from a verizon prepaid plan)
Unlimited 3G Data, Voice & Text with the lack of 4G connectivity.

I was wondering if anyone knows if this is true, and if so, how to do it.
I have an additional Droid Bionic that I would like to try this on if it is possible (on this phone or some other Android phone)
Also, if once done, can it be reverted back to it's normal state or would the phone be stuck forever?

Not sure I've seen it but it could exist. I'd rather wait for another promo with 4GB of data for the price of 2 before its pay for anything 3g. With the size of Web sites and other things, 3g is just Yoko behind the times for me

As far as what I understand so far, not all phones can be flashed to Verizon's Prepaid Unlimited Plan, and the ones that can be flashed to the prepaid plan, need a 2nd basic phone with a prepaid unlimited plan on it already.
So you would need a prepaid phone with an unlimited voice & data plan ($50)
Plus an Android phone.

I already been to the Verizon website and am aware of those prepaid plans available through Verizon's website, but that is not what I'm talking about.

What I'm talking about is different, which is why I don't think I'm being understood or I'm not explaining myself very clearly.
I'll try again...

There is a couple of Android smartphones for sale on eBay that use Verizon's $50 prepaid plan.
Yes, a smartphone, (let's say an HTC Droid Incredible) it has unlimited voice, text and unlimited 3G (No 4G) and still only $50 (not $80 like the current prepaid smartphone plans Verizon currently has)

According to the sellers on eBay & Craigslist you need 2 phones for this to work...
1.) a dummy phone on the $50 unlimited prepaid plan
2.) a smartphone (let's say the Droid Incredible)

Then, they flash your smartphone so that you can use the $50 prepaid plan on your smartphone and get unlimited voice, text & unlimited 3G data (again, No 4G) on your smartphone.

They claim this process also works with a couple of MiFi devices so as to be able to get unlimited 3G data while still only paying $50.

There is also claims that Sprint Android phones can be flashed to the Verizon $50 prepaid plan as well.

This is the process that I'm trying to understand how it works, not the one through the Verizon website.

There's a difference between unlimited 3G data on a dummy phone Vs. unlimited 3G data on an Android phone.

I have a second Bionic on which I wouldn't mind trying this but there is a list of certain Android phones that can be on the Verizon $50 prepaid unlimited plan and I don't think the Bionic qualifies (not sure). I don't necessarily mean dumping the 4G we use for 3G but as a secondary option, an alternative you could say.

Maybe a friend has a MetroPCS 4G phone and according to what I've been researching, has horrible speeds making it like a 3G service. Let's not forget T-Mobile's "4G" network which is not really 4G but merely a fast 3G.

Maybe this type of plan could be for grandma, a friend, mom, dad, the kids and never have to worry about overages because it's prepaid but with a cool phone, not a phone they'd be ashamed of and have to hide because it looks like a shiny new brick. (I'm sounding like a salesman, but it's true lol..)

It's just something interesting which caught my attention and I'd figure I'd post about it to see if anyone knew anything regarding this subject.

I think it'd a good idea to keep revisiting this thread, maybe with some research links, as a lot of us BIONIC owners will be coming up on contract renewal in 9 - 12 months, and if VZW decides to force us to lose unlimited data, we may start exploring alternative options such as this.

I found a guide, free too but not for the Bionic, for another phone. Anyhow, I will try to experiment with this "process" and possibly post back my results. I need to possibly trade my 2nd Bionic for another phone first, so this "process" might take awhile.

OK. So I tried this process and there is some points where I'm stuck at.
It makes and receives calls but it won't connect to Verizon's 3G network unless I send a picture message first which then establishes a 3G connection. The thing is if I turn the phone off, then turn it back on, it won't reconnect to 3G thus having to send a picture message again to establish a 3G connection. Is there away around sending a picture message to establish a 3G connection?
Although, on the other hand if I setup a hotspot, other devices can connect to the hotspot and be able to browse the web.

When I do manage to connect to 3G after sending a picture message, the connection speeds are slow (either because of my location, or because of the phone I'm using which is from a different large CDMA wireless provider) The download/upload speeds average at about 130kbps which is a bit slow to download anything. I'll try driving to a different location later on and try the speed tests again.

I thought there was a difference between mobile web (dumb and feature phones) and data (smartphones). Trying to wrap my head around this and I'm not so sure from what I've read that you're not on mobile web.

You are right there is a difference, but I am able to connect the Android cell phone to the internet after sending a picture message to another phone I have. This method establishes a 3G connection and then I have a (slow) but workable internet connection. If the phone is rebooted, the 3G connection is lost until the process is repeated.

For what I have researched so far, it is possible to obtain faster speeds on average up to 2000kbps. I'm nowhere near those speeds. I'm trying to figure out why my connection differs. I haven't bought anything, I'm more or less experimenting on the process and reporting what I'm finding as I go along. Now if I could just figure out the connection issue.

So far, I can receive calls, I can make calls, I can send text messages, but I cannot send picture messages (it attempts to do so but fails a couple of minutes later, trying to send a picture message is the only way I have found to establish a 3G connection, the picture doesn't send but the 3G does connect - well sometimes the picture is sent, sometimes it's not. I'm currently working on a fix) My speeds vary on average of about 128kbps for both upload and download. The only other way that I can get a faster speed is if I setup a hotspot. I connect my Bionic to this hotspot and I test the upload/download speeds and I get about 0.80 to 0.90Mbps Download and 0.80 to 0.90Mbps Upload (Sometimes if I'm lucky, the hotspot speeds will reach 2.0Mbps for both upload/download) When I turn the hotspot off, I try to send an MMS to establish my 3G connection and the speed drops again to 0.10Mbps-ish. Plain texts work fine, picture message sometimes.
So far, what I have is a portable hotspot that makes calls and text.

Might I remind you, this is a Verizon Prepaid plan on a Sprint phone model SPH-D600 aka Conquerer. I will keep trying with the errors I'm having as far as internet connectivity issues and what-not. I've found another method to try and get the "better 3G speeds" to work more efficiently but this time with an actual Verizon 3G Android phone. I would trade one of my Bionic's but I don't have the required amount of posts to put it up on the buy/sell/trade forum. I'll try and get a VZ 3G Android in the time being and keep on experimenting.

$50 Prepaid Verizon Android... you're getting closer.

As it is, 3G speeds are not that bad at all, I turned off 4G on the Bionic I have and put it on 3G only and the speeds average to about 2.22Mbps/upload and 1.98Mbps/download which is decent but I guess the speeds could either be faster/slower depending on my location and so on.

I fixed the 3G connectivity issue, now 3G is on regardless if I reboot, disable/enable wireless connections. A little slow but I have a constant 3G connection, the downside is that I lost the hotspot option (the only hotspot app that was available, was a Sprint Hotspot, since it's a Sprint Phone) and I still can't send picture messages. Emails, calls, plain text work ok.

I tried, but I can only find the FoxFi Addon, I installed the AddOn, opened it and it asked me to download FoxFi, the PlayStore opens up and I get a message that states "This item isn't available by your carrier". I've tried a ton of other apps but most are just shortcuts to enable the phones internal hotspot app.

The hotspot was initially working, although the phone didn't have Sprint Service when the hotspot was working, it has been on the Verizon Prepaid service since the beginning of this process. Ever since I changed the Sprint settings to Verizon settings to establish a permanent 3G connection, I lost the hotspot. I'm gonna try to revert the settings to get the hotspot working again and just go from there.

The phone still has some Sprint Settings left like the embedded 4G settings which are useless to me for now since I can't get around editing those. I can enable Sprint's 4G and it connects but I can't make use of Sprint's 4G settings.

Have you thought about putting an ICS-based ROM on there, after rooting (if you're not already)?

Click to expand...

Would the ICS based rom you're talking about help me out? I haven't really messed around with the phone lately. I've been mainly using the phone as an alarm clock with dial up connection (until I can fix the hotspot)